Читать книгу The Holiday Escapes Collection - Сандра Мартон - Страница 83

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

‘SHE'S PINK!’

Estelle couldn’t believe the little pink fingers that wrapped around hers. Even Cecelia’s nails were pink—it was suddenly her favourite colour in the world.

‘That’s the first thing we said.’ Andrew was holding Cecelia’s other hand. ‘She’s been fighting so much since the day she was born.’ Andrew smiled down at his daughter.

All were too entranced by the miracle that was Cecilia to notice how much Raúl was struggling.

Raúl looked down at the infant, who resembled Estelle, and could hardly believe what he had almost turned his back on.

‘I have to go and do some work,’ Raúl said. ‘Do you want to get lunch later?’

Estelle looked up, about to say no, but he was talking to Andrew.

‘Just at the canteen,’ he added.

‘That would be great.’ Andrew smiled. ‘Estelle, could you take Amanda for some breakfast? She wants one of us with Cecelia all the time but she needs to get out of the unit and get some fresh air.’

‘Sure.’ Estelle stood.

‘I thought we could go for dinner tonight.’

This time Raúl was speaking to Estelle.

‘I’m here to be with my niece.’

‘Andrew and Amanda are with her. As long as she continues to improve I am sure they expect you to eat.’

‘Of course we do,’ Andrew said. ‘Go out tonight, Estelle. You need a break from the hospital too!’

* * *

It was a long day. The doctors were in and out with Cecelia, and talked about taking her breathing tube out if she continued to hold her own. Amanda’s parents went home, to return at the weekend, and after they had gone Estelle finally persuaded Amanda to have a sleep in one of the parents’ rooms.

It was exhausting.

As she closed the door and went to head back to Cecelia she wondered if she had, after all, grown far too used to Raúl’s lifestyle—she would have given anything to be back on his yacht, just drifting along, with nothing to think about other than what the next meal might be and how long it would be till they made love again.

Being Raúl’s tart hadn’t all been bad, Estelle thought with a wry smile as she returned to Cecelia.

It was being his wife that was hell.

‘Amanda’s asleep,’ Estelle said. ‘Well, for a little while.’

‘Thanks for being here for us,’ Andrew said. ‘Both of you. Raúl’s great. I admit I wasn’t sure at first, but you can see how much he cares for you.’

She felt tears prick her eyes,

‘Did you ask him to offer me a job?’

‘A job?’

She couldn’t lie easily to her brother, but instantly he knew that Estelle’s surprised response was real, that she’d had no idea.

‘Raúl said that when things are sorted with Cecelia there will be a job waiting for me. He wants me to check out his hotels, work on adjustments for the disabled. There will be a lot of travel, and it will be tough being away at first. But once Cecelia’s better he says we can broaden things so it’s not just about travelling with disabilities but with a young child as well.’

It was a dream job. She could see it in her brother’s eyes. Soon he would be earning, travelling, and more than that his self-respect and confidence would start to return.

‘It sounds wonderful.’ Estelle gave him a hug, but though she smiled and said the right thing she was furious with Raúl—his company was about to implode, and she and Raúl were soon to divorce quietly.

How dared he enmesh himself further? How dared he involve Andrew in the chaos they had made?

She wanted it to be tomorrow, she wanted Raúl gone so she could sort out how she felt, sort out her life, sort out how to tell him that the temporary contract they had signed would, however tentatively, bind them for life.

There was a note from Raúl waiting for her when she reached the hotel, telling her that he was tied up in a meeting but would see her at the restaurant at eight.

‘You signed up for this,’ Estelle told herself aloud as she put on her eye make-up. She wondered if it would be just dinner, or perhaps a club after, or…

Estelle closed her eyes so sharply that she almost scratched her eyeball with her mascara wand. He surely wouldn’t expect them to sleep together?

He surely wouldn’t insist?

Then again, Estelle told herself as she took a taxi to the restaurant, this was Raúl.

Of course he would insist.

Worse, though, she knew she must comply—no matter the toll on heart.

* * *

He turned heads. He just did.

He was waiting for her at the bar, and when they walked into the smartest of restaurants he might as well have being stepping out of a helicopter in a kilt—because everybody was looking at him.

‘You look beautiful,’ Raúl told her as they sat down.

‘Thank you,’ she said.

He could feel the anger hissing and spitting inside her, guessed that she must have spoken to Andrew since lunchtime.

‘It’s a lovely dress,’ he commented. ‘New?’

‘I chose it.’

‘It suits you.’

‘I know.’

He ordered wine. She declined.

He suggested seafood, which he knew she loved, but he had read in one of the many leaflets he perused in the hospital waiting room that pregnant woman were advised not to eat it.

‘I thought you loved seafood?’ Raúl commented when she refused it, wondering what her excuse would be.

‘I’ve had enough of it.’

She ordered steak, and he watched her slice it angrily before she voiced one of the many things that were on her mind.

‘Did you offer my brother a job?’

‘I did.’

‘Why would you do that? Why would you do that when you’re about to walk away? When you know the company’s heading for trouble?’

‘We’re not heading for trouble,’ Raúl said. ‘I have been speaking with Luka at length today, and Carlos and Paola too. There is to be a name-change. To Sanchez De La Fuente… Anyway, if there is trouble ahead it will only be in the office. Your brother will not be dealing with it.’

‘What about when we divorce? Will you use him as a pawn then?’

‘Never. I tell you this: it is a proper offer, and as long as your brother does well he will have a job.’

‘You say that now…’

‘I always keep my word.’ He looked at her. ‘I don’t lie,’ Raúl said. ‘From the start I have only been myself.’ He watched the colour spread up her cheeks. ‘You get the truth, whether you like or not. I think we both know that much about me.’

Reluctantly she nodded.

‘It is only wives that I employ on a whim. I am successful because I choose my employees carefully and I don’t give out sympathy jobs. Your brother pointed out a few things that could be changed at the hotel. He would like the menu outside the restaurant to be displayed lower too. He said he would not like to find out about the menu and the prices from a woman he was perhaps dating with.’

Estelle gave a reluctant smile. It was the sort of thing Andrew would say.

‘He said that a lower table at Reception would be a nice touch, so that anyone in a wheelchair could check in there. That means I do not have to refurbish our reception areas. He has saved me more than his year’s wage already.’

‘Okay.’

‘I don’t want my hotels to be good, I want them to be the best—and by the best I mean the best for everyone: businessmen, people with families, the disabled. Your brother, as I told him, will soon be all three.’ He looked at her for a long moment, wondering if now she might tell him. ‘It is good to see Cecelia improving,’ Raúl said. ‘It must be a huge relief.’

‘It is,’ Estelle admitted. ‘I think we’re only now realising just how scary the last few months have been.’

‘Does seeing your niece make you consider ever having a baby?’

She gave a cynical laugh.

‘It’s just about put me off for life, seeing all that they have had to go through.’

‘But they’ve made it.’

She wasn’t going to tell him about the baby, Raúl realised. But, far from angering him, it actually made him smile as he sat opposite the strongest woman he knew.

‘Here…’ At the end of the meal he smeared cream cheese on a cracker, added a dollop of quince paste and handed it to her.

‘No, thanks. I’m full.’

‘But remember the night we met…’

‘I’d rather not.’

He saw tears prick her eyes and went to take her hand. He could not believe all that they had been through in recent weeks. As she pulled her hand away Raúl wasn’t so sure they’d survived it.

‘I’m sorry for hurting you. I overreacted—thought I was going to lose everything, thought I might not be able to give you the lifestyle—’

‘Like I need your yacht,’ Estelle spat. ‘Like I need to eat out at posh restaurants seven nights a week, or wear the clothes you chose.’

‘So if you don’t want all that,’ Raúl pointed out, ‘what do you want?’

‘Nothing,’ Estelle said. ‘I want nothing from you.’

He called for the bill and paid, and as they headed out of the restaurant he took her hand and held it tightly. He turned her to him and kissed her.

It tasted of nothing.

He kissed her harder.

She wanted to spit him out. Not because she loathed his mouth but because she wanted to sink into it for ever—wanted to believe his lies, wanted to think for a moment that she could hold him, that he’d want their baby as much as she did, that he’d want the real her if he knew who she was.

‘Where now?’ Raúl asked. ‘I know…’ He held her by the hips. ‘You could show me Dario’s…’

‘I didn’t meet Gordon at Dario’s,’ Estelle said. ‘I told you that.’

‘We could go anyway,’ Raúl said. ‘It’s our last night together, and it sounds like fun.’

He saw the conflict in her eyes, saw her take a breath to force another lie. He would not put her through it, so he kissed her instead.

‘Let’s get back to the hotel.’

‘Raúl…’ She just couldn’t go through with it—could not keep up the pretence a moment longer, could not bear to be made love to just to have her heart ripped apart again.

‘What?’ He took her by the hand again, led her to a taxi.

* * *

‘Come on, Estelle…’ He undressed speedily. ‘It’s been a hell of a day. I would like to come.’

‘You can be so romantic.’

‘But you keep insisting this is not about romance,’ Raúl pointed out.

Her face burnt.

‘I don’t understand what has suddenly changed. We have been having sex for a couple of months now…’ He was undoing her zipper, undressing her. He was down on one knee, removing her shoes. ‘Tomorrow we are finished. Tonight we celebrate.’

‘I don’t want you.’

‘So you did the other times?’ he checked.

At every exit he blocked her. At every turn he made her see it had never been paid sex for her—not for one single second, not for one shared kiss. She had been lying from the very start. For she had loved him from the start.

‘Estelle, after tonight you have the rest of the century off where we are concerned.’

He laid her on the bed and kissed her, felt her cold in his arms. His mouth was on her nipple and he swirled it with his tongue then blew on it, watching it stiffen and ripen. Then he took it deep in his mouth, his fingers intimately stroking her. He filled her mouth with his tongue and she just lay there.

This was what she had signed up for, Estelle reminded herself. She didn’t have to enjoy it. Except she was.

It was like a guilty secret—a filthy guilty secret. Because she wanted him so—wanted him deep inside her. She turned her cheek away but he turned it back and kissed her. She did not respond—or her mouth did its best not to.

He felt the shift in her…kissed her back to him.

He felt the motion of her tongue on his, felt her.

‘Tell me to stop and I will,’ Raúl said.

She just stared at him.

‘Tell me…’

She couldn’t

‘You can’t stop this any more than I can…’

He moved up onto his elbows and she tried not to look at him, looked at his shoulder, which moved back and forth over her.

‘Tell me…’ he said.

She held on.

‘Tell me how you feel…’

In a moment she would. In a moment she’d be sobbing and begging in his arms. She lifted her hips, and then lifted them again, just so she could hurry him along.

‘I’m going to come…’ she moaned.

‘Liar.’

He pushed deeper within her, hit that spot she would rather tonight he did not, for her face was burning, and her hands were roaming, and her hips were lifting with a life of their own as she let out a low, suppressed moan.

She felt a flood of warmth to her groin, felt the insistence of him inside her, the demand that she match his want.

‘You couldn’t pay for this…’ He was stroking her deep inside and seducing her with his words. ‘You could never fake this…’

He slipped into Spanish as she left the planet; he toppled onto her and bucked rapidly inside her as she sobbed out her orgasm. She didn’t know where she started or ended, didn’t know how to handle the love in her heart and the child in her belly. All belonged to the man holding her in his arms.

‘You want me just as much as I want you.’

‘So?’ She stared back at him. ‘What does that prove? That you’re good in bed?’ She turned away from him and curled up like a ball. ‘I think you already knew that.’

‘It proves that I am right to trust you. That it is nothing to do with contracts or money. That you do love me as much as I love you.’

‘You don’t know me, though.’ She started to cry. ‘I’ve been lying all along.’

‘I know you far more than you think,’ Raúl said.

‘You don’t. Your father was right. I like churches and reading…’

‘I know that.’

‘And I hate clubs.’

‘I know that too.’

‘I’m nothing like the woman you thought you met.’

‘Do you not think I’d long ago worked that out?’ Raúl kissed her cheek. ‘My virgin hooker.’

He heard her gurgle of laughter, born from exhausted tears.

‘I don’t get how you’re the one with no morals, yet I’m the one who’s lied.’

‘Because you’re complicated,’ Raúl said. ‘Because you’re female.’ He kissed her mouth. ‘Because you loved me from the start.’

She went to object, but he was telling the truth.

‘Do you know when I fell in love with you?’ Raúl said. ‘When I saw you in those tatty pyjamas and I did not want you in Gordon’s bed. It had nothing to do with me paying you. I deserved that slap, but you really did misinterpret my words.’

She was so scared to love him, so scared to tell him about the baby. But if they were to survive, if they were to start to trust, then she had to. It never entered her head that he already knew.

‘When were you going to tell me you’re pregnant, Estelle?’

She felt his hand move to her stomach, felt his kiss on the back of her neck. All she could be was honest now. ‘When I was too pregnant to fly.’

‘So the baby would be English?’

‘Yes.’

‘And you would support it how?’

‘The same way that billions of non-billionaires do.’

‘Would you have told me?’

‘Yes.’ She needed the truth from him now and she turned in his arms. ‘Are you still here because of the baby?’

‘No,’ Raúl said. ‘I am here because of you.’

She knew he was telling her the truth—not just because he always did, but because of what he said.

‘I have had three hellish nights in my life. The first I struggle to speak about, but with you I am starting to. The second was the night after I’d found out about my brother and you were there. I went to bed not thinking about revenge or hate, but about a kiss that went too far and a slap to my cheek. I guess I loved you then, but it felt safer not to admit that.’

‘And the third?’

‘Finding myself in a nightmare—but not the one I am used to,’ Raúl said. ‘I was not in a car calling out to my mother. I was not begging her to slow down, and nor was I pleading with her to wake…’

Tears filled her eyes as she imagined it, but she held onto them, knew she would only ever get glimpses of that time and she must piece them together in the quiet of her mind.

‘Instead I realised, again, that a woman I loved was gone because of my harsh actions and words. Worse, though. This time it was my fault.’

She heard him forgive what his five-year-old self had said as the past was looked at through more mature eyes.

‘I went to Angela. She was always the one I went to when I messed up, and I had messed up again. I asked her what to do. I was already on my way to you. It was then that she told me that at least my father had known about the baby… It would seem I was the last to know.’

‘I never told her.’

‘I’m glad that she guessed. She told my father that morning. I’m glad that he knew, even if I did not.’ He looked at her and smiled. ‘Opposites attract, Estelle.’ He kissed her nose. ‘It’s law. You can’t argue with that.’

‘I’m not arguing.’

‘Did you hate every dance?’ he asked.

She shook her head. ‘Of course not.’

‘We’ll have to get babysitters when we want to go out soon.’

He blew out a breath at the thought of the changes that were to come and she saw that he was smiling.

‘Who’d have thought?’

‘Not me,’ Estelle admitted.

‘So, how do you tell your wife you want to marry her all over again?’

‘We don’t need to get married again,’ Estelle said. ‘Though a second honeymoon might be nice.’

‘Where?’

He was going to make her say it.

‘Where?’

‘On the yacht.’

Yes, she could get used to that—especially when he made love to her all over again. Especially when he made her laugh about the maid’s secret swapping of his DVDs.

No, he had never lied. But he’d never been more honest—and it felt so good.

‘Do you think your family will notice a change in us?’

‘No.’ Estelle smiled. ‘They think we met and fell head over heels in love.’

‘They were right.’ Raúl pulled her to him and then kissed her again. ‘We were the only ones who couldn’t quite believe it.’